Meet colour trend predictor, Leatrice Eiseman
This style diktat influences everything from catwalk fashion to the perky little cushion you buy to liven up your home — but who decides this? Pantone do.
The company is probably most famous for its colour-block mugs and mesmerising colour cards. Pantone not only determine every shade, hue and nuance of each colour, but are accepted by the design world as a global authority. It has had this pre-eminent position for 50 years.
Pantone’s executive director is Leatrice Eiseman and she heads up a committee responsible for determining the colour of the year:
“We chart future colour direction and study how colour influences human thought processes, emotions and physical reactions,” says Leatrice.
“Our team makes the decision based on research gathered on our travels, as well as utilising our expertise to find the most meaningful, symbolic colour of a given time period.
"We research the world of art, fashion, interiors, entertainment, leading sports events, as well as the social dynamic — as we interpret it — and we are constantly on the lookout for ascending colours that are considered, and then chosen, by the team.”
Leatrice’s job marries her educational background in psychology and design. She has written nine books on colour, the first of which brought her to the attention of Pantone.
Fifteen years later, her role with the organisation is more than just determining the colour of the year: “I work primarily with Pantone’s consulting division to many industries, presenting colour and design seminars at trade shows, universities, or in-house for companies needing an educated approach to colour, and I’m also actively engaged in colour forecasting.”
With a busy and varied role, Leatrice still finds time to run her own colour consultancy. With such colour immersion in her professional life, how does she approach it at home?
“Colours are like my children,” she says.
“It’s difficult to choose a favourite, as each represents particular moods and emotion. I have a real pot pourri, including a soft, buttery yellow in my living room that extends into the kitchen, and there’s a restful, yet happy, shade of periwinkle in my master bedroom.”
So does Marsala feature anywhere in her home, which is on the west coast of America, in Washington State, a place of heavy rain, grey skies and a climate more akin to Ireland than America?
“I have a small, rather dramatic powder room in a wine red, not unlike Marsala. Each of the other bedrooms are varying greens and the dining room is an appetising chilli-pepper red. Of course, they are all Pantone colours,” she says.
At a time when there’s a clear shift from rigid colour rules in interior design to more creative guidelines, style and colour co-ordination remain a goal for Leatrice.
“Colour must be in tune with your lifestyle and comfort level. For each person, that can vary. Use colours that you really respond favourably to, or you associate with certain pleasant times in your life, a favourite home environment that brings pleasant memories, or colours that exist in places you have visited or would like to visit.”
In addition to the colour of the year, Leatrice and her team also chose nine palettes for 2015, ranging from a selection that “highlights the elegance of the purple family, adding a dramatic interplay against classic mahogany, to a palette that delivers the essence of spontaneity”.
Such a description is enough to make a die-hard neutral lover take to the colour charts. For a woman whose career might have taken a very different path, Leatrice has the ability to communicate her passion for colour with conviction.
“I wanted to be a teacher,” she says, “and, actually, that is still what I am doing — opening people to the joy and potential of colour.”
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